Rent arrears management practices in the housing association sector

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3.4 Conclusions The nature and environment of rent arrears management is changing . A number of key drivers of this change were raised, but the most significant appears to be the impact of the PAP on rent arrears and good practice interventions . Although the sector is heterogeneous and practices will consequently be different across the sector, many HAs have moved away from generic housing management at least in the area of rent arrears . There has been an increasing focus on advice to occupiers at an early stage (at the commencement of a tenancy and/or when arrears arise) . These changes are likely to have made an impact on the use of court proceedings, leading to their decline . Other factors include better HB performance . It is unclear whether the decline in the use of possession proceedings is general or specific . 50 The issue of the use of Ground 8 leads to sharp divisions between organisations . Each argument has a counter-argument . Although some arguments are at the philosophical end – the nature of social housing, due process - some of the arguments are based on opinion as opposed to actual evidence . There is a suggestion that on-the-ground practice and views about the use of Ground 8 is likely to differ between HAs .
Chapter 4 Rent collection and arrears management: national and regional trends Chapter summary HAs’ arrears management performance has remained fairly steady over recent years, with the mean rate of rent arrears falling very slightly from 5 .6% of collectable rent to 5 .3% in the three years to 2007-08 . At least since 2005-06, however, HB service performance appears to have improved significantly . The national average number of days to process new HB claims was cut from 33 days to 25 days in the two years to 2007-08 . HAs evicted some 9,000 tenants from general needs housing in 2008-09 – equivalent to around 0 .51% of the dwelling stock . While the equivalent rate for supported housing will have been much higher this largely reflects the different forms of tenancy prevalent in the two sub-sectors, with the less secure status of supported housing tenants making it much easier for tenancies to be repossessed . The vast majority of evictions from general needs housing continue to result from actions triggered by rent arrears . Statistical evidence suggests that rates of rent arrears eviction in the HA sector fell by around a quarter in the three years to 2007-08, though a slight increase was recorded in 2008-09 . The downward trend up until 2007-08 was also reflected in local authority eviction rates . 2007-08 HA eviction rates were highest in the Midlands and lowest in London . Rent arrears eviction rates have tended to run significantly higher for traditional HAs (equivalent to 0 .52% of dwelling stock in 2008-09) than for stock transfer landlords (0 .40%) . Having peaked in 2004- 05 typical eviction rates have fallen in recent years for associations of all types and sizes . However, this has been rather less marked among the largest landlords . At the same time, while they account for only a small proportion of the overall dwelling stock, the highest rates of eviction are probably found among smaller associations (those with 250-999 dwellings in ownership) . 4.1 Chapter scope This chapter sets out an analysis of HA activity in managing rent arrears over the past few years . The main sources are the former Housing Corporation’s RSR and CORE datasets . First, we trace recent trends in associations’ arrears management performance and in the performance of local authority HB teams . However, the main focus of the analysis is on HA possession actions in the four years to 2007-08 . Rent arrears management practices in the housing association sector 51
Page 1 and 2: Rent arrears management practices i
Page 3 and 4: Contents Executive summary . . . .
Page 5 and 6: Executive summary Introduction This
Page 7 and 8: Key underlying factors were said to
Page 9 and 10: could, in part, reflect the growing
Page 11 and 12: overpayments and suspensions were p
Page 13 and 14: Chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 Backgrou
Page 15 and 16: arrears management and related aspe
Page 17 and 18: “… there may occasionally be ci
Page 19 and 20: under Article 8 of the Convention,
Page 21 and 22: y HAs . 37 The Circular informed as
Page 23 and 24: Pre-action protocol for possession
Page 25 and 26: The purpose of these interviews was
Page 27 and 28: Table 1.1 - Case Study HAs Organisa
Page 29 and 30: Chapter 2 Rent arrears management p
Page 31 and 32: Pawson et al’s study found that 9
Page 33 and 34: 2.3 Rent arrears management practic
Page 35 and 36: this with any certainty . 69 Howeve
Page 37 and 38: authority can also lead to a lack o
Page 39 and 40: 2.5 The use of Ground 8 Although th
Page 41 and 42: In the Hunter et al study, 97 which
Page 43 and 44: some comment on the effect of the P
Page 45 and 46: • Ground 8 provided certainty to
Page 47 and 48: There was a difference of opinion a
Page 49 and 50: 3.3 The use of Ground 8 Whereas ans
Page 51: do so early enough, or at all . Cla
Page 55 and 56: 4.3 Housing Benefit service perform
Page 57 and 58: Table 4.3 - Housing association evi
Page 59 and 60: As shown in Figure 4 .1, CORE data
Page 61 and 62: were collected for landlords with l
Page 63 and 64: Most associations report initiating
Page 65 and 66: 5.2 Organisation of rent arrears ma
Page 67 and 68: Table 5.2 - Primary structure of ar
Page 69 and 70: Table 5.3 - Recent changes in organ
Page 71 and 72: Table 5.6 - Staff training provisio
Page 73 and 74: Within the transfer landlord cohort
Page 75 and 76: • Where arrears were accrued befo
Page 77 and 78: Table 5.9 - Estimated percentage of
Page 79 and 80: elatively high response rate achiev
Page 81 and 82: The survey sought to collect statis
Page 83 and 84: Ground 8 actions typically accounte
Page 85 and 86: How is the scale of Ground 8 use ch
Page 87 and 88: already routinely exercising the ac
Page 89 and 90: Chapter 6 Case study evidence Chapt
Page 91 and 92: Annex 2 outlines our method, includ
Page 93 and 94: a couple of weeks to three months)
Page 95 and 96: to officers and policies . Officers
Page 97 and 98: RM put it, “caused uproar from te
Page 99 and 100: preferred form of the organisation
Page 101 and 102: tenant contacts are now recorded on
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as a result, would make an order un
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use - in these cases, it is viewed
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g) The tenant perspective In each c
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Ground 8 was generally to scrutinis
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Ground 8 was said to be used as a
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The key stakeholders regarded the P
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ule it would not be used where HB w
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Table A1.1 - Evicted households by
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uncontactable as a result) . Where
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Just under half of all cases in the
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Annex 2 Case study HA selection Our
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Annex 3 Profile of case study housi
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However, after a review across its
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as developing joint working with th
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Annex 4 Case study topic guides HA
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19. What has been your recent exper
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12. How are your tenants helped wit
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9. If RSLs rely on Ground 8, what i
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4 Tenant employment circumstances (
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10 Value (£) of arrears at defined
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Rent arrears management practices in the housing association sector

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